Granados v. NYS DOCCS
- Laura Swain
- 1:22-cv-08804
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 8
Granados v. NYS DOCCS: Judge Swain denied reconsideration, recusal, and requests for relief from the dismissal.
Delia Granados’s requests to reopen or reconsider the dismissal, and her request for Judge Swain’s recusal, were denied; the action remains closed. The defendants were not required to respond to a reopened case.
What happened
In Granados v. NYS DOCCS, Delia Granados, who represented herself, asked the court to undo its dismissal of her action. The court had dismissed the case because of Eleventh Amendment immunity, lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, claims for money damages against immune defendants, and failure to state a claim.
The court treated Granados’s filings as requests to change the judgment, reconsider the decision, obtain relief from the judgment, and remove the judge from the case. Granados argued, among other things, that the court should not have dismissed the case before discovery or an answer from the defendants.
Judge Laura Taylor Swain denied the recusal request and denied the requests under Rules 59(e) and 60 and Local Civil Rule 6.3. The action remains closed, and the court denied fee-waived appeal status because it certified that an appeal would not be taken in good faith.
The detailed version
- Granados v. NYS DOCCS · No. 1:22-cv-08804
- Laura Swain
- Mar. 6, 2023
Background
Delia Granados filed this action without a lawyer and requested permission to proceed without paying filing fees. The court previously dismissed her complaint and later dismissed her second amended complaint. The court stated that the claims were barred by the Eleventh Amendment, were outside the court’s subject-matter jurisdiction, sought money damages from defendants immune from that relief, and failed to state a claim. Judgment was entered on February 6, 2023.
On February 13, 2023, Granados filed documents seeking to vacate the dismissal, challenge the judge’s ruling, and appeal. The court liberally construed the filings as a motion to alter or amend the judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e), a motion for reconsideration under Local Civil Rule 6.3, a motion for relief from the judgment under Rule 60(b), and a motion for the judge’s recusal.
Jurisdiction
Although filing a notice of appeal ordinarily transfers control over the appealed aspects of a case to the court of appeals, the district court retained authority to decide a timely Rule 59 or Rule 60 motion. Because Granados filed her motion on the same day as her notice of appeal and within 28 days after judgment, the court concluded that it could consider the requests.
Recusal request
Granados argued that Judge Swain had a conflict of interest and was biased against her because the judge had dismissed the action. The court denied recusal. It explained that judicial rulings alone almost never establish a valid basis for recusal and concluded that Granados’s request was based on the judge’s rulings in the case.
Rule 59(e) and Local Civil Rule 6.3 requests
A Rule 59(e) motion asks the court to alter or amend a judgment. A party must show that the court overlooked controlling law or factual matters previously presented. The court found that Granados had not made that showing and denied the Rule 59(e) motion.
The court stated that the standard under Local Civil Rule 6.3 is the same. For the same reasons, it denied Granados’s motion under that rule. The court also rejected Granados’s references to New York state procedural rules concerning summary judgment, explaining that those rules did not apply and that the case had not reached the summary-judgment stage.
Rule 60(b) request
Rule 60(b) permits relief from a judgment for specified reasons, including mistake, newly discovered evidence, fraud or misconduct, a void judgment, satisfaction or reversal of the judgment, or another reason that justifies relief. The court concluded that Granados had not shown that any of the first five grounds applied and denied relief under those provisions.
The court also denied relief under Rule 60(b)(6), the provision for other reasons justifying relief. It found that Granados had not shown the extraordinary circumstances required for relief under that provision.
Disposition
The court denied Granados’s motion for reconsideration, including the filings docketed at ECF 37 through 40. The action remains closed. The Clerk of Court will accept only documents directed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. The court also certified under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3) that any appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied fee-waived status for an appeal.
Read the full 8-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.